Rice is the second largest produced cereal in the world. At the beginning of the 1990s, annual production was around 350 million tons and by the end of the century it had reached 410 million tons.
Production is geographically concentrated in Western and Eastern Asia. Asia is the biggest rice producer, accounting for 90% of the world's production and consumption of rice. China and India, which account for more than one-third of global population supply over half of the world's rice. Brazil is the most important non-Asian producer, followed by the United States. Italy ranks first in Europe.
The world's major rice-producing countries - including the two most populous nations, China and India - have emphasized the importance of continuing to develop new rice varieties to guarantee Asia's food security and support the region's economic development.
Today, rice is grown and harvested on every continent except Antarctica, where conditions make its growth impossible. The majority of all rice produced comes from India, China, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma, and Bangladesh. Asian farmers still account for 92-percent of the world's total rice production. More than 550 million tons of rice is produced annually around the globe. In the United States, farmers have been successfully harvesting rice for more than 300 years. There are thousands of strains of rice today, including those grown in the wild and those which are cultivated as a crop.
| Forms of Processed Rice |
| Major Rice Producing Countries |
| Types and Forms of Rice |
World Rice Production
| World Rice Production (in '000 metric tonnes) | ||||
| Country | 1999/2000 | 2000/01 | 2001/02 | 2002/03 |
| China | 138,936 | 131,536 | 124,320 | 123,200 |
| India | 89,700 | 84,871 | 91,600 | 80,000 |
| Indonesia | 33,445 | 32,548 | 32,422 | 32,500 |
| Bangladesh | 23,066 | 25,086 | 25,500 | 26,000 |
| Vietnam | 20,926 | 20,473 | 20,670 | 20,500 |
| Thailand | 16,500 | 16,901 | 16,500 | 16,500 |
| Burma | 9,860 | 10,771 | 10,440 | 10,440 |
| Philippines | 7,772 | 8,135 | 8,450 | 8,300 |
| Japan | 8,350 | 8,636 | 8,242 | 8,200 |
| Brazil | 7,768 | 7,062 | 7,480 | 7,600 |
| United States | 6,502 | 5,941 | 6,764 | 6,457 |
| Korea, South | 5,263 | 5,291 | 5,515 | 5,300 |
| Egypt | 3,787 | 3,965 | 3,575 | 3,800 |
| Pakistan | 5,156 | 4,700 | 3,740 | 3,500 |
| EU | 1,751 | 1,567 | 1,620 | 1,792 |
| Taiwan | 1,349 | 1,342 | 1,245 | 1,197 |
| Australia | 787 | 1,259 | 930 | 965 |
| Others | 28,282 | 27,270 | 27,575 | 28,156 |
| WORLD TOTAL | 409,200 | 397,354 | 396,588 | 384,407 |
